Tough questions for Sony

Submitted by lev on August 2, 2006 - 8:08am

Ken Fischer, over at Ars Technica, has a great breakdown of a Q and A session at Siggraph that got a little heated. Apparently Mitch Singer, executive director of the digital policy group at Sony, had to endure some awkward questions about DRM. Ars Technica has that story.

Karen Sandler, an attorney from the Software Freedom Law Center, challenged Singer: "I am deeply suspicious of DRM technology in part because the DRM we see now says that it protects copyright law, but it also prevents legitimate use, for parody, news and education. (It) is overbroad for legitimate use. As the restriction stands now, when public material falls in to the public domain, the DRM tech stays in place and does not fall away. DRM also has the potential to compromise privacy and security."

News.com broke the report, noting that "the discussion went on for almost two hours and didn't often stray from concerns about fair and personal use, privacy and rights protection for digital content."